Altering a Skirt

Hello! Today on Simply Saturday I’ll be sharing a quick little project I did yesterday: altering a skirt. Let’s get started!

Here is the skirt in question (pardon the wrinkles 😉 ). I liked the skirt, but it was an awkward length. The obvious answer to that? Alter it!

The first step of altering a skirt is finding out what new length you want it to be. I had tried it on the night before and stuck a safety pin at the place where I thought I should cut it, taking into account the extra length I would need for hemming.

It turned out that I needed to cut off eight-and-a-half inches from the bottom edge.

I marked it all the way around using the ruler and chalk.

Then cut along the chalk line.

Which left me with this un-hemmed, shorter skirt.

For the hemming, I folded over the bottom edge at half-an-inch…

…then used the widest stitch on the machine to keep it in place.

I then folded that half-an-inch hem over again, so that now there were no unfinished edges of fabric.

Then stitched that in place using a standard size stitch and green thread.

And then I was done! A super simple little project, that makes an otherwise unflattering skirt rather more wearable! 😉

Being able to sew an alter outfits is also a good reason to take a second look at clothes (especially at the thrift store) that you may not have thought would be wearable. Many can be improved with just a few little changes. Such as this dress. 🙂

Well, that’s all for now. do you alter your own clothing? ~ Emily